Josh Bersin of Deloitte reported that "More than 60% of all companies are redesigning (or have redesigned) their performance management process, typically moving from top-down rating and ranking to a feedback-centric, developmental, often rating-less model.”

There’s a couple of benefits to a non-numerical performance review model:

Improves morale

Performance reviews will feel more constructive

Poorly rated employees will be less defensive at the performance review

There’s also a few disadvantages:

Employees will lose an opportunity to see how they are perceived relative to others